at his workbench to craft the half-hull and
177 days from the boat’s order by the New
York Yacht Club to its launch. Its price
was $175,000 (about $4.5 million today),
which included a 50 percent surcharge for
engineering and exotic materials. It beat
Sir Thomas’s boat in three straight heats
and was never raced again. It was broken
up the following year, signaling for the
Herreshoffs “the end of an ascending line
of beautiful and useless racing boats,” as

stiletto, converted to a U. S. Navy torpedo
boat (top), pictured in an engraving from
Harper’s Weekly, June 1889. The 31-foot-long
catamaran Duplex (center), built in 1877, sails
along the River Thames. Nathanael Herreshoff
climbs aboard Defender in this 1895
photograph (above) by John S. Johnston.